Celebrations in the UK1 The United Kingdom has many celebrations, some very old. Here are some of the most famous ones, in order of the year.
New Year’s Day (January 1) Every January 1st, London’s New Year’s Day Parade (started in 1987 to raise money for charity) passes through the West End with floats, bands, and street performers. In Northumberland’s Allendale, people carry barrels filled with tar through the village and then throw them onto a bonfire. In Scotland, the tradition of “First Footing” honours the first visitor after midnight—usually a tall, dark-haired man bringing coal, whisky, and black buns for good luck.
The Twelve Days & Epiphany (December 25 – January 6) After Christmas Day, the church calendar celebrates the Twelve Days of Christmas, with carols and wassailing, until Epiphany on January 6. On this day, people often remove decorations and attend services remembering the visit of the Magi to Christ.These customs come from ancient Midwinter festivals, later adapted by Christianity.
Late Winter Festivities
Burns Night (January 25) Celebration of poet Robert Burns with a supper. A piper announces the haggis (a dish made of sheep’s offal in its casing). The host recites Burns’s “Address to a Haggis” before cutting it, and then guests eat.
St. Valentine’s Day (February 14) Originating in Chaucer’s 1382 poem, Valentine’s Day became a celebration of romantic love in England. Today, couples exchange cards, flowers, and chocolates—or go to Gretna Green in Scotland, where young couples (16+) can marry without parents’ permission.
Shrove Tuesday & Pancake Races The day before Ash Wednesday, families eat pancakes and sometimes take part in races, running while flipping pancakes in pans. The name “Shrove” comes from “shrive,” meaning to confess sins before Lent.
Ash Wednesday Marks the start of Lent. People receive ash crosses on their foreheads (ashes of burned palms mixed with holy water or oil), showing repentance before six weeks of fasting and reflection.
Spring Celebrations
St. David’s Day (March 1) Celebration of Wales’s patron saint with parades, choirs, and dishes like leek soup (cawl). People wear daffodils or leeks, and the red dragon flag is displayed.
St. Patrick’s Day (March 17) Irish communities in the UK—especially in London and Nottingham—celebrate with parades, music, dance, and shamrocks. Trafalgar Square and Covent Garden turn green.
Mothering Sunday (Fourth Sunday of Lent) Originally a day to visit one’s “mother” church, Mothering Sunday now honours mothers and mother figures with cards, flowers, handmade gifts, and family meals or afternoon teas.
Easter & Easter Monday Easter Sunday combines religious services commemorating Christ’s resurrection with traditions like egg hunts, chocolate bunnies, and lamb roasts. On Easter Monday—echoing medieval “Hocktide”—communities hold egg-rolling contests, Morris dances and spring fairs.
St. George’s Day & Shakespeare Day (April 23) England’s patron saint is remembered with flags, parades and red-rose lapels, while literature lovers mark Shakespeare’s birth and death anniversary with readings, performances and festivals.
May Day & Spring Bank Holiday The first Monday in May (or May 1st) revives ancient spring rites: maypole and Morris dancing, flower-crowned May Queens and feasting. Late-May’s Bank Holiday offers garden visits, short breaks—and Gloucestershire’s famously perilous Cooper’s Hill cheese-rolling race.
Early Summer Observances
The Queen’s (Monarch’s) Official Birthday (Second Saturday of June) Trooping the Colour parades through central London, while honours lists are published and diplomatic missions around the world mark Britain’s national day.
Father’s Day (Third Sunday of June) Families celebrate fathers and father figures with cards, gifts or special outings—often a roast dinner and a pint—echoing the Mothering Sunday tradition.
Midsummer’s Eve (June 23) Rooted in Celtic equinox rites, communities light bonfires, leap flames for luck, and share folklore of fairies and magic as they pay tribute to the sun’s strength at summer’s peak.
High Summer
Summer Bank Holiday & Notting Hill Carnival (Last Monday in August) As August wanes, Brits enjoy a long weekend for festivals, garden parties or seaside trips. In London’s Notting Hill, Caribbean-inspired costumes, steel bands and parades have turned the carnival—born in 1965 as an anti-racism protest—into Europe’s second-largest street party.
Autumn & Remembrance
Feast of St. Francis (October 4) Churches bless beloved pets in honour of the patron saint of animals, sometimes accompanied by concerts or radio tributes to St. Francis’s compassion.
Halloween & Souling (October 31 – November 2) Descended from Celtic Samhain, Halloween parties and trick-or-treating blend ancient bonfire rites with costumes and lanterns. Souling on All Souls’ Day (November 2) recalls medieval processions for “soul cakes,” with lantern-carrying and song.
Guy Fawkes Night (November 5) Also Bonfire Night, this commemorates the 1605 Gunpowder Plot. Towns light fires, stage fireworks displays, and sometimes combine with Halloween in costume-and-pyrotechnic parties.
Remembrance Day (November 11 & Second Sunday) At 11 am on November 11—and again on the nearest Sunday—Brits observe two minutes of silence, wear poppies, and attend services and parades to honour the fallen of past conflicts.
St. Andrew’s Day (November 30) Scotland’s Saltire flies as ceilidh dances, concerts and folklore ceremonies celebrate the patron saint, from Dumfries’s Burns-style songs to apple-peel divination and wax-dipping for young women seeking marital omens.
Christmas & Year’s End
Christmas Eve (December 24) Last-minute shopping gives way to midnight Mass or carol services. Many families decorate trees, sing Nine Lessons and Carols from King’s College, and attend Christingle or nativity services—children’s oranges adorned with candles, sweets and ribbons.
Christmas Day (December 25) Whether or not they observe the Nativity, most Britons exchange gifts from stockings, share roast turkey with all the trimmings, stir flaming Christmas pudding, and blend Christian symbolism with evergreen decorations inherited from pre-Christian traditions.
Boxing Day (December 26) Once the day for gift “boxes” to servants and the poor, now it’s for post-Christmas sales, countryside walks, football matches or racing. Historic tales of manor-house alms have evolved into hampers and holiday shopping sprees.
New Year’s Eve & Hogmanay (December 31) Parties ramp up towards midnight, when fireworks, hugs and kisses usher in the year. Scots extend festivities—First Footers arrive with whisky, coal and sweet treats to bless each home—while “Auld Lang Syne” bids farewell to the past and welcomes what comes next.